


Not Your Burden

by PrairieChzHead (msannomalley)



Series: Lost Causes [5]
Category: The Trixie Belden Mysteries - Julie Campbell Tatham & Kathryn Kenny
Genre: Alternate Universe - 1970s, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Gen, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-28
Updated: 2017-11-28
Packaged: 2019-02-08 02:23:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12854715
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/msannomalley/pseuds/PrairieChzHead
Summary: Mart Belden, a double amputee with PTSD, contemplates the unthinkable.





	Not Your Burden

**Author's Note:**

> TW: Suicide Attempt. 
> 
> If you or someone you know is thinking about suicide, there is help out there 24/7.  
> In the US: 1-800-273-8255.

Enough of dreams! No longer mock  
  The burdened hearts of men!  
Not on the cloud, but on the rock.

\--Alfred Noyes

**December 22, 1973**

It all started with the noblest of intentions.

Join the Army, have Uncle Sam give you the money to pay for that college education, and when you're mustered out, go onto college and spare your parents the expense of having to pay for at least one of their children's education.

It didn't work out that way.

Mart got the money, but he lost so much more.

And now he was lying in his bed in his old childhood bedroom, the same one he used to shared with Brian, and eyeing the brown bottle of sleeping pills that sat on his nightstand.

****

 

Life, they say, is a journey. They also say that the journey is the reward. Mart wondered what was so rewarding about being in hell. He eyed the pill bottle again. Dr. Ferris had been kind enough to give Mart those pills so he could sleep at night.

Mart wanted to go to sleep and never wake up. There was nothing worth waking up to anymore.

Di, his childhood sweetheart, had dumped him after he came home. She said it was because he fought in something she was "prinicpally against". But the undertones to her words and her actions had said, "I don't have time for a cripple."

But there was Dan. Dan came home a year after Mart did. Dan would understand. Dan, however, was off in his own little world, and seemed to be uncomfortable around Mart. Then one day last June, he took off for parts unknown.

College had been a mistake. In order to pass your college classes, you have to be able to actually get to the classroom.

His older brother was preoccupied with med school. His sister had this damned fool idea in her head of becoming a cop. Bobby was only fifteen. His parents, even though they tried, just didn't understand.

Mart had no goals, no longer had a purpose. It was trying just to get up in the morning. He looked at the sleeping pills again. Slowly, his hand reached out for the bottle.  _I bet if I took the whole thing, that would do it._  A sharp knock on his bedroom door made him snatch his hand back.

"Mart," Helen Belden said. "I'm leaving to go to the garden club meeting. You want me to get you anything?"

 _A noose would be nice._ "A glass of water."  _To help the pills go down easier._

His mother went downstairs and in a few minutes, returned with a glass of water. "I won't be gone too long. Bobby is out doing patrols with Mr. Maypenny and he'll be back later." Bobby Belden had Dan's old job on the Wheeler's game preserve. She went over to Mart's bed and smoothed his long, curly hair. "Are you feeling okay, son?"

"I'm fine, Moms," Mart replied.

"If you say so," Helen said. She frowned slightly, sensing that something was wrong.  _Maybe you should skip the meeting and stay here. No, he's just tired. Let him rest._ "I'll see you later, son."

When Mart heard the sound of the Belden's station wagon being started, then leaving the farm, he eyed the pills again.

This wasn't the first time Mart contemplated doing what he was about to do. The seed had been planted one day when he was in the bathtub and he saw his father's straight razor lying on the sink. He wondered what it would feel like to press that cool, sharp steel against the flesh of his inner wrist. He wondered if it would hurt too much if he pressed harder and he wondered what it would feel like to intentionally slice open the veins and how the blood coming from it would feel as it flowed out of his body, just like the how life energy had flowed out of his soul.

A month later, he tried it. He didn't go through with it. Bobby had to use the bathroom.

The seed started to bloom, and the idea of ending his pain once and for all took root. They didn't understand. They didn't care. They wouldn't miss him. He would no longer be their burden.

Mart thought about hanging himself, but nixed the idea when he realized that you had to be able to stand up to hang the noose.

Guns were out. Nobody in the house owned one. Anyone else he knew that had one had hunting rifles.

He thought about stabbing himself. He couldn't get downstairs on his own to get the damned knife. And a demented thought of his mother getting upset with him for getting blood all over Grandma Belden's heirloom rug had made him laugh wildly. Neat was better. Less trauma for the family to deal with.

He reached for the bottle, then held it in his hand for the longest time. He contemplated it. He studied the typewritten label. He saw his name, last name first. Then Dr. Ferris's name. Then the name of the medication, something, that at one time, he cared how to pronounce correctly. Then his eyes were diverted to the colorful labels pasted to the side.  _Do not operate heavy machinery after taking this medication._

Mart laughed. Hysterical, raw sounds came from his throat. The idea of Mart Belden, Legless Freak operating heavy machinery was just too much.

Then he sobered.

Freak.

Burden.

He couldn't get around on his own. And the good folk of Sleepyside had taken to looking at him with unconcealed pity. It made his skin crawl.  _That poor Belden boy. What a shame. He could have been something._

But at least they looked. Dan hadn't been able to look at him at all. Di wanted nothing to do with him.

He hated them both.

Mart had a vision of the two of them standing in his room. They couldn't move and they were forced to stand there and watch as Mart calmly swallowed white pill after white pill, and he only stopped once to explain to them that they made him do what he was doing now and they had to pay the price for abandoning him when he needed them the most.

The vision vanished abruptly. He had heard Trixie say that when Dan left, he left Regan a note about "needing to get his head together". Mart couldn't fault Dan for the getting his head together part. At least he was doing something about his own pain.  _But why couldn't he stay here and do it?_

Mart tossed the amber bottle up in the air and then he caught it.  _It's now or never._

Mart looked at the alarm clock at his bedside. It was two o'clock. Bobby would be back home around three or four. He wasn't sure when his mother would be back. His father wouldn't be home until after five. He had at least an hour.

Mart reached into the nightstand drawer and pulled out an envelope, the contents only known to him. He prepared that envelope a week ago. Soon, everyone would see it.

Slowly, he unscrewed the cap from the bottle. Then he tipped the bottle over, emptying its contents into the palm of his hand.

He started counting them.

There were twenty pills in the palm of his hand. Twenty little white pills that would lull him to sleep and he would never wake up. Ever. They could bury him and get on with their burdenless lives.

_I wish I could have come home in a box._

Calmly, Mart swallowed the first pill. He washed that down with water. Then he took the second pill. And then the third.

_I'm not your burden anymore._

Then he took the fourth, fifth and sixth, washing those down with water as well.

_Goodbye, cruel world._

The seventh, eighth, ninth, and tenth pills were next.

_I'm halfway there. I wonder if I'll get my legs back where I'm going?_

 

He took the eleventh and twelfth pills, draining the last of his water from the glass.

_"One pill makes you larger/One pill makes you small./And the ones that mother gives you/Don't do anything at all."_

He dry-swallowed the next one.

_But the ones that Dr. Ferris gives you do things alright._

He wasn't taking the pills as quickly in succession as he had before. It hurt his throat to dry-swallow them. Mart thought about stopping after thirteen, but the seven remaining sleeping pills beckoned him like a seductress plying her charms on her unsuspecting man.

He was starting to feel drowsy and he thought about stopping right there. But those pills called out to him to finish what he had started.

Mart swallowed Number Fourteen. Six more to go. A song popped into his head.

_"The rollercoaster ride I took is nearly at an end. I bought my ticket with my tears and that's all I'm going to spend."_

He waited to swallow the fifteenth sleeping pill.

_Maybe I should stop now. Fifteen should do the trick._

He swallowed it. He felt tears spring into his eyes.

_Oh God! What am I doing? I don't want to die._

Pill Number Sixteen went down. The tears spilled down his face.

_Yes, I want to die._

Twenty minutes had passed since Mart swallowed that first pill. His eyelids were growing heavier and he had to shake his head.

_You've only got four left._

Mart's head fell back against the pillow.

_I can't take them if I fall asleep._

He tried to fight off the waves of sleep that were coming at him. His hands relaxed.

_The bottle fell to the floor._

The four remaining pills landed beside the bottle.

Everything went dark.

****

 

Bobby returned from Mr. Maypenny's with the container of hunter's stew the old man had sent along. Everyone loved that hunter's stew. It was the cure for everything that ailed you. And Bobby had noticed that Mart hadn't been feeling himself lately.  _He hasn't been himself for quite awhile now,_ Bobby thought.

The container was still warm and Bobby only stopped in the kitchen momentarily to get a spoon. Then he raced up the stairs to Mart's room.

"Hey Mart! I'm home and I brought you some...thing." Bobby stopped short, noticing that Mart was asleep.

"Oh well," Bobby said to no one. "It's just as good reheated." The younger Belden turned around to leave, but an empty brown pill bottle lying on the floor caught his eye.

That was up on his nightstand this morning.

Then he saw the four white pills on the floor.

That bottle was fuller than that this morning.

Bobby set the bowl and the spoon down, then went over to his brother.

"Mart?" he asked tentatively.  _You're seeing things, Belden. The rest of those pills probably ended up under the bed or something. The bottle probably got knocked over. He's just sleeping._

Bobby shook Mart's shoulder. No response.

Bobby crouched down to look under Mart's bed. The only thing he saw were some magazines that had been stashed there and some dust bunnies. No pills. He stood up again, fear making his heart pound madly.

I know there were more than four pills in that bottle.

Bobby shook Mart again. "Mart? Wake up. I brought you some stew from Mr. Maypenny." Another shake. "Mart. Please wake up."

It became clear to Bobby what had happened. Mart took all those pills at the same time. Mart did it on purpose. Bobby gave Mart's shoulder another shake. "Please, Mart, wake up! Wake up!" Bobby could hear the desperation in his own voice.

Bobby knew that Moms had a garden club meeting today. And his dad was still at work.  _What do I do?_ He was starting to panic.

Then common sense took hold and Bobby went into the hallway to find the phone.

****

 

Helen Belden returned home to find a couple of squad cars and an ambulance in her driveway. Her first thought was that Bobby had gotten hurt somehow. She parked the car and ran towards the house.

When she reached the back porch, two paramedics were coming out her kitchen door, one holding onto each end of a gurney. Bobby was hovering behind them, visibly upset, and clutching an envelope in his hand. Behind Bobby, stood Regan, looking white-faced.

_Thank God, Bobby's safe._

Then she looked at the gurney and found her second son lying there.

_Mart?_

Sergeant Molinson came up to her. "Helen..." Wendell Molinson paused, looking down at the ground. He looked up again into Helen's confused face. This was the part of the job he hated the most. Delivering bad news to people.

Molinson began again. "Mart..." He took a deep breath. "Your son overdosed on sleeping pills. If Bobby hadn't found him when he did..."

_Mart? Overdose? Sleeping pills? Am I hearing things?_

"They're taking him to the emergency room. Are you going to ride along?"

"I can bring Bobby," Regan said.

Helen nodded dumbly.

_Overdose? What's going on here?_

Molinson sheparded Helen into the ambulance.

_My baby tried to kill himself. Why? WHY?_

****

 

Sgt. Molinson went to the First National Bank of Sleeypside to give Peter Belden the news in person. After rushing over to the hospital, he and Helen were ushered into a different room and Bobby had to wait in the main waiting room. Regan stayed with the boy to keep him company. Bobby stared at the linoleum floor, the same word repeating over and over in his head.

Why?

His hands still clutched the envelope he found in Mart's room. Bobby hadn't opened it yet. He wasn't sure if he wanted to open it.

"I'm going to get some coffee," Regan said to Bobby. "You want anything?" Bobby shook his head, so Regan left for the cafeteria.

 _Were things really that bad for Mart?_  Bobby thought and thought and couldn't come up with any reason why things would be so bad, Mart would want to do something so drastic.  _Didn't Beldens stick together and pull through?_

"I got here as soon as I could," Bobby heard a voice say. He looked up and saw Honey Wheeler standing there. "How is he?"

"I don't know," Bobby said. "Moms and Dad are in this other room and they haven't come out yet. How did you know?"

"Regan called me," she said. "Do the others know yet?"

"I don't know," Bobby said. "I don't think so." Trixie was living in the city and Brian was out in Los Angeles. "I don't remember their phone numbers."

"Well, I called Jim," Honey said. "He knows. He's coming back home for the holiday." Honey sat down in a chair. Then she laughed without humor. "It's just me and Jim this year. My parents decided to go skiing in Gstaad." Bobby couldn't imagine not spending Christmas without his Moms and Dad nor could he imagine Moms and Dad not wanting to spend Christmas with the family.

Regan came back with a paper cup. "Honey," he said.

"I just got here," she said. Then she noticed the envelope in Bobby's hand. "What's that?"

"I found it in Mart's room," he said.

An hour later, Peter came into the waiting room. Three pairs of eyes looked at him. Peter took a deep breath. "Mart's going to be okay," he said. "He's stable right now and he's resting. They're transferring him to a regular room."

"Thank God," Regan said.

"Do the others know?" Honey asked.

"I called them. Brian and Trixie know," Peter replied.

"Can we see him?" Bobby said. "Where's Moms?"

"Not yet," his father answered. "Your mother is with Mart right now." Peter found a chair, and as if the weight of the world had become too much for him to carry, he sank into the chair and he covered his face with his hands.

> > > > ****
>>>> 
>>>>  
>>>> 
>>>> Dear Moms, Dad, Brian, Trixie, and Bobby,
>>>> 
>>>> If you're reading this, I'm dead. I'm dead because I can't take it anymore. I'm dead because the pain is too much.
>>>> 
>>>> I'm not your burden anymore. I'm not the inconvenience that I've become, and yes, that's what I am. A burden, an inconvenience. So you don't have to help me get up and down the stairs and go with me to the store because I can no longer drive myself. Now you will have time freed up and you can thank me for that.
>>>> 
>>>> Once upon a time, I had dreams. I had ambitions and dreams and goals and I knew what I wanted to do with my life. I can't do them anymore. Everything I've ever wanted from life, I can't have. You try to be noble, and you try to help out, and this is what you get. All I wanted was to get the money to go to college. That's all I wanted. Now I can't even go to school, not unless some higher institution of learning decides that they want people in wheelchairs in their schools.
>>>> 
>>>> You probably don't understand this. I don't expect you to. Not when you have lives of your own and some of you have to go so far away to live them and you don't have time for me anymore. Not your poor, crippled brother. Sometimes, I hate you for that. Just like I hate Di for leaving me and just like I hate Dan for leaving, too.
>>>> 
>>>> Speaking of Dan, if he ever decides to call or write and let someone know where he is, tell him that I don't blame him for how I ended up in this chair in the first place. I know he blames himself for it. There was nothing he could have done. I don't blame him. I blame the United States Government for planting that mine in the first place. And if he still says it's his fault, then tell him, that unless he actually planted the fucking thing himself, it's not his fault.
>>>> 
>>>> So, yes, I'm dead. Mourn me if you have to. Mourn the legless freak I've become. Then feel free to get on with your lives.
>>>> 
>>>> I'm sorry it had to come to this. But there's no other way. I can't stand being helpless.
>>>> 
>>>> Mart

**Author's Note:**

> I originally posted it in 2002, but then took it down. For reasons. This is the first time in 15 years, I put this online. 
> 
> The lyrics quoted are from "White Rabbit" by Jefferson Airplane and "Red Rubber Ball" by The Cyrkle.


End file.
